As Black History Month drew to a close, I found myself addressing the Department for Education. My 'lunchtime seminar' talk  was called " Africans in Tudor and Stuart Britain: before the slave trade." (I hastened to add that I meant before the English really got going at the slave trade, not before the Portuguese and Spanish slave trade, and pointed out that John Hawkins' voyages in the 1560s were something of an aberration, which were not to be repeated for some 70 years). 

A few days before my talk, the poet Benjamin Zephaniah had been quoted  by the BBC as saying that black and Asian pupils are turned off history because they are told only "half the story" in British schools.

The same BBC article reported that Education Secretary Michael Gove "has said schools should focus on a traditional narrative of British history in response to concerns it had become too politically correct [and]... that the current approach to history denies 'children the opportunity to hear our island story', and... this has to change."

Continue reading the main story... the current approach to history denies "children the opportunity to hear our island story", and this has to change."The phrase "our island story"  jumped out at me because it reminded me of an old book I'd grown up with.  Our Island Story is a nostalgic, patriotic storybook written in Australia in 1905  by Henrietta E. Marshall. This Edwardian tome was reprinted in 2005 by the think-tank Civitas, with the aim to send a free copy to each of the UK's primary schools. David Cameron told the RSC it was his favourite childhood book in 2010, and that it "really captured [his] imagination and ... nurtured [his] interest in the history of our great nation.”  But what stories does this book tell? And are they really only "half the story"?

Take Sir Francis Drake, for example. A classic Elizabethan hero, he appears of course in Our Island Story, where Marshall describes him as "very bold and daring", and tells the story of the singeing of the King of Spain's beard, and him refusing to face the Armada before he'd finished his game of bowls on Plymouth Hoe. But my research has shown me another side of Drake, that is writ large upon the Drake Jewel (above, a present from the Queen in 1588, which Drake wore  hanging from his belt in this 1591 portrait) but that is not included in Marshall's version of events. 

The bust of an African man on the Drake jewel has been interpreted as a symbol of Drake's alliance with the Cimaroons.  These were the Africans who had runaway from the Spanish who had enslaved them and set up their own communities. Their local knowledge was invaluable to Drake when he allied with them to capture the Spanish silver train in Panama in 1573.  One of these Cimaroons, a man named Diego, returned to Plymouth with Drake and accompanied him on his circumnavigation voyage of 1577-80. Unfortunately he died near the Moluccas, from wounds received from the hostile inhabitants of Mocha Isle, off the coast of Chile. 

Diego was not the only African onboard. We know of at least three more, one of which, a woman named either Francesca or Maria, who was abandoned, heavily pregnant, on Crab Island, Indonesia. William Camden, the first historian of Elizabeth I's reign, reported in his Annales that Drake "purchased much blame…for having most inhumanely exposed in an island that negro or blackamore maid who had been gotten with child in his ship.” However this, and other stories of Africans who encountered Drake, seem to have disappeared from popular record. 

Drake's cousin, John Hawkins doesn't appear in Our Island Story at all. Drake may well have accompanied him on some of his slaving voyages in the 1560s. And later voyages that Drake made to the Caribbean, for example his raid of 1585-6, also resulted in Africans coming to England. 

The idea of "Our Island Story" needs to be re-imagined. To be 'insular' can mean to be cut off from the rest of the world. But the histories of most islands, from Crab and Mocha isles, mentioned here, to the Island of Britain, are stories of comings and goings, of invaders and immigrants.  The story of our island is one of these. And we need to tell our children the whole story, and to do so we need to re-tell it for our time and not rely on the imaginings of an Edwardian patriot, however picturesque. 

Last Tuesday, I headed for Peckham Library to give a talk billed as "African musicians and Renaissance royal celebrations".  This consisted of an exploration of what is known of the lives of John Blanke, pictured here playing at the Westminster Tournament of 1511, and the 'More taubronar', a drummer at the court of James IV of Scotland in the early 1500s. 

The  Southwark Council theme for this year's Black History Month was "Celebration" and in line with that, I showed the role these musicians played in royal celebrations.

 John Blanke performed at Henry VIII's coronation in 1509, and in 1511 at the Westminster Tournament, a huge celebration organised in honour of the new prince, Henry. This child was born to Katherine of Aragon on 1st January 1511, but sadly died only ten days after the Tournament in February. I wonder if the 60 ft long Tournament Roll, (which depicts John Blanke twice, in the procession of people coming to and from the jousting event shown in the centre), was completed in that brief time, or whether they carried on painting it after the prince's death? The Royal Exchequer accounts show that Blanke was paid ten times his usual wage for the Tournament, so he had cause for celebration too! And the following year, he had a personal celebration, as we know he married in 1512 and that Henry VIII gave him a wedding present!

Up in Scotland, we find the More taubronar playing alongside four Italian minstrels at the court of James IV.  He might have sounded something like this. They travelled around Scotland with the court- and at one point the king bought him his own horse. Not just a drummer, the taubronar was also a skilled choreographer who devised a dance to celebrate Shrove Tuesday in 1505.  He was also paid wages and  was married, with a child. Though he seems to have been injured, possibly fatally in 1506: the royal payments to a doctor survive. Nor was he the only African at the Scottish court at that time- but that's another story.

Both men are part of a much longer tradition of black musicians in European royal courts- going back to at least 1194 when Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI was preceded by black trumpeters in his entry  into Palermo, Sicily (see below).  Valued for their skill and paid wages, we can still only guess at the daily details of these men's lives.

You can read more about Africans at European courts here.

On Friday evening, I spoke at the Readers Research: Blacks in Renaissance Britain event at the British Library, along with Open University graduate Michael Ohajuru  (you can read his highly complimentary version of events here). The event was chaired by Dr. Caroline Bressey of the UCL Equiano Centre. 

It was quite a thrill to be speaking at the British Library, a place I have made regular pilgrimages to for many years now. I even spent some time there helping to catalogue some watercolours of animals in the first Indian zoo in Barrackpore back in 1999.  But I digress...

Michael spoke first, and I was very jealous of his excellent presentation skills and all the lovely pictures he had to illustrate his talk, which was on the black magus he had found in a rood screen painting of The Adoration of the Magi (c.1520) in the V&A, which was probably made in Devon.  In fact, he very effectively compared it with other rood screen images he had found in Devon, and traced the journey of the black magus image from Cologne to Bruges, Alsace and Devon. You can read a transcript here and download his  presentation.  One of the most interesting images for me was of Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI's entrance into Sicily in 1191, heralded by black trumpeters, as it reminded me of the long tradition of royal musicians to which John Blanke, Henry VIII's 'black trumpet' , who I am speaking about on Tuesday at Peckham Library, belonged. 

My only real criticism was that Michael didn't really differentiate between  Europe and England, with statements such as "Blacks were seen legally as slaves and culturally as barbarians." Whereas my research has show that Africans were not slaves in England at this time. He quotes  "the chronicler of an English voyage to Guinea" in 1554 (Robert Gainsh) as describing "A people of beastly living, without god, lawe, religion or common wealth". However, that same voyage brought five Africans back to London, who admittedly were described as "slaves" in the text, but  were not treated as  such, but only kept here only long enough to learn some English, after which they were returned to Guinea to act as interpreters and trade factors. The only record we have of their experience is brief but evocative: "some were tall and strong men, and could wel agree with our meates and drinkes" although "the coulde and moyst ayer dooth sumwhat offende them". Looking out the window today, I can imagine why they might have found the London air objectionable! Though, at least according to the Cartwright judgement of 1569, "the air of England is too pure an air for slaves to breath in". 

My own talk is a bit of a blur now (Michael seems to remember it better!).  Basically I shared some documents I'd found in the Lansdowne Manuscripts, a collection held by the British Library.  A letter written by the Mayor of Bristol, William Hopkins to the Privy Council in 1590 (two years after the Armada battle and at the height of the war with Spain), and an attached set of accounts written by his Chamberlain, regarding a prize ship that had been brought into Bristol by her Majesty's (Elizabeth I's) pinnace The Charles (captain Jonas Bradbury). There were 32 Spanish or Portuguese and 135 Africans on board the prize ship.  Using the documents, I explained why they were on the ship, what happened to them during their stay in Bristol, and the significance of the fact that they were sent back to  Spain within the week. 

The conversation and Q&A afterwards was wide-ranging: from Hollywood swashbucklers to Moorish Spain via Caspar Van Senden.  Perhaps the most philosophical question came from a gentleman from Ghana: why do we always view Africa as peripheral to Europe, perhaps Europe is in fact peripheral to Africa? This is a matter of perspective I suppose. One book I've read that tries to address this is David Northrup's Africa's Discovery of Europe (Oxford, 2002).  I think I'll read it again!

The event was recorded, and we're hoping it will be available as a podcast in due course.  

Our talks were actually the first in a Readers' Research series- which seems a great idea. Often I look around  (and I think  Dr. Bressey made this point too) and wonder what the studious-looking people around me are studying. On the ocassions when I have managed to strike up a conversation, it has always been interesting. So anything that encourages us to interact and gives us more reason to hang out in the BL's many cafés, seems like a good idea! The fact that Michael and I, not exactly wallflower types, actually both discovered the material we presented in summer 2008 but never met until last autumn shows how much more could be done to forge connections between readers.

 If you're kicking yourself that you didn't make it, or were turned away (we sold out!), then please come along to one of my upcoming talks at Peckham Library on Tuesday or The National Archives on Friday 16th November. 

Just back from a great talk by my friend Dr. Kathy Chater, who I've mentioned here before. She told us some of the fascinating stories she'd uncovered in the Old Bailey court records.  You can now check them out yourself online: http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/ 

But back in 2000, when Kathy began her research, she had to go through the cases on microfilm, scanning the pages for mention of black people. I sympathise as I've spent plenty of time doing the same with parish registers! The advantage of this over the modern keyword search is that you get a feel for the source and the context- Kathy noted how other people were treated in court, so was able to understand the black experience better.  

One of the great things about the Old Bailey records is that they're verbatim accounts of what was said in court, so you really hear people's voices coming through.  One memorable quote came from Ann Duck, who is recorded as shouting during an assault: "Hamstring the dog that he may never run after me again!", another one that made us laugh was the woman who testified "he put his impudence into me"!

Chater concluded that black people in the long 18th century were pretty law- abiding, as she's found less than 200 of them appearing in some 54,000 trials. There were still some juicy stories to be told however- of highwaymen and footpads, theft, rape and murder.  I was reminded of how extreme and sometimes gruesome 18th century punishments could be (see Hogarth's print above). We also learnt of Thomas Latham,  possibly the first black police constable (c.1746). The case is copied on the excellent Black Presence website, here: http://www.blackpresence.co.uk/black-people-at-the-old-bailey/

Anyway, I'm not going to try to recount every case here. You'll have to look for them yourself on the amazing Old Bailey website, or check out Kathy's book, now in paperback.

Just wanted to draw your attention to this great resource.  Kathy is the expert on Africans in the period following mine, and has amassed a huge database of references to their lives here in Britain. This is a recording of her speaking at the National Archives last year. You can download it here. 

The talk  is described  on the site as follows:

"What was life like for the ‘average’ black person in England before the 20th century? Most were quietly getting on with their lives, seeking employment, getting married and raising families. It takes a lot of work to uncover their life histories because there was no legal discrimination against these individuals. Glimpses into their lives can be found buried in The National Archives’ vast collection, which reveals unexpected stories. Dr Chater’s talk challenges some commonly held assumptions that have been made about the lives of black Britons during the period of the British slave trade. Dr Kathleen Chater is an independent historian and writer. Her doctoral thesis is published as Untold Histories: Black people in England and Wales during the period of the British slave trade, c. 1660-1807. She came to the history of Black British people through genealogy and has written books and articles on this subject. This talk was part of our diversity week event in November, highlighting the diversity of The National Archives’ collection." 

Kathy has also written a book on the subject which I've illustrated above, and is giving a talk about Black People at the Old Bailey in Islington next month, which looks really interesting.  The records of the Old Bailey are available online and are a fascinating source of information on everyday life from 1674-1913, containing 197,745 criminal trials held at London's central criminal court.  So once you've listened to Kathy, you can look up some of the cases for yourself!

 Last week I found myself amongst a throng of white-clad revellers clutching mojitos and dancing under the palm leaves. I was not, however, in the Caribbean, but in a small atmospheric town on the Costa Brava named Begur. Beneath a beautiful  16th century castle, these narrow streets host an annual fiesta in homage to Cuba. Why Cuba? Well, it seems that back in the 19th century many people from Begur emigrated to Cuba. Some returned, having made their fortune, and built beautiful villas in  the town. They became known as 'Americanos' or 'Indianos', hence the 'Fira d'Indians'.  I wore a white dress, tasted a mojito made with unrefined cane sugar and danced with my beloved in the town square to some reggaeton-eque rhythms.  This blog has some great pictures,  and some more 'atmospheric' shots of mine are below. 

A while ago I spent some time looking into the history of Sir Pedro Negro, a Spanish mercenary soldier who served Henry VIII in his Scottish wars and was knighted by Protector Somerset in 1548. 
There was some dispute about what colour his skin was. So I dug about and found his coat of arms, his will and a strange letter written  in 1549 by Marion, Lady Hume,  which refers to a 'Mour'... 

My article, 'Sir Pedro Negro: what colour was his skin?' originally published in Notes & Queries in 2008, has now been posted on www.blackpresence.co.uk , a great site which aims to bring together information about Black British History and make it freely available online.

Excited to see that my article on Africans in Early Modern London is now online.  


The London Metropolitan Archives are a great place to research, with friendly and helpful staff  and quite a variety of records- recently augmented by the transfer of records from the Guildhall Library Manuscripts Section, which is where I first went to search for Africans in parish registers. 


Read my article to find out more about Helen Jeronimo, suspected of stealing ‘14 bookes of callikoe, 26 pieces of pachers and 108 lb. of suger’ from a merchant named Francis Pinto, her husband  Thomas Jeronimo 'mariner and moor' and other stories of Africans in Early Modern London that I found in the archives...

When I heard Todd Akin assert that pregnancy as a result of rape is “really rare” and that "from what I understand from doctors":

"If it is a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try and shut that whole thing down," I  wondered which doctors he'd been speaking to. 

The last time I’d heard such a theory was when reading early modern English social history books. I wasn’t the only one- Guardian blogger Vanessa Heggie traces the “legal position that pregnancy disproved a claim of rape” back to the 13th century. I remember being horrified when I first read that a 16th century rape victim had no case if she became pregnant.

In fact the medical theory on which this law was based is even older. As Corrine Saunders explains in her book Rape and Ravishment in the Literature of Medieval England:

“One widely circulated medical theory, based on the ideas of Galen, held that women as well as men emitted seed, and therefore that only when an emission was made, through orgasm, could conception occur: Failure of either partner to achieve orgasm rendered intercourse nonprocreative... According to the Galenic theory of conception, for pregnancy to occur as a result of rape was impossible...”

As Galen lived from 129 –c. 200 AD, we can see that these ideas have been in circulation since ancient times.
  But even more disturbingly, Akin is not the only modern man to have espoused such ancient views regarding female biology, as Robert Mackey demonstrates in his latest blog for the New York Times.  

I thought it was fascinating that the works of Galen could continue to have currency as late as the Tudor and Stuart period that I’ve studied. It’s even more surprising to see men dangerously innocent of modern biology today. 

My thesis 'Africans in Britain, 1500-1640' is now available to read in the Bodleian library. You can access the listing on SOLO [Search Oxford Libraries Online] or read the short abstract. 

I found records of over 350 Africans in Early Modern Britain in the course of my research, and used them to consider questions including how Africans came to Britain, what work they did, their religious and social experience and their status in the eyes of the law. My thesis includes an appendix listing all the  evidence I found of Africans in a wide range of sources from parish registers to court records.